The Vampire Diaries 5.17 Rescue Me

The Vampire Diaries 5.17 Rescue Me

Because we don't see Klaus in his wolf form, it pretty much a free for all playground.

So the idea I had was Klaus going out to shift on the night of the full moon, which already makes Elijah frown, but sometimes it's best to let Klaus do what he wants to do.

The issue starts when he doesn't return the next morning and by noon Elijah thinks this is getting ridiculous/something happened, so he goes out to search for Klaus, since he is the only one who's actually seen Klaus in his wolf form before.

After a few hours or so, Elijah finally finds his brother, still in his wolf, which makes him suspicious. Klaus is a hybrid, so he can change by will, so why didn’t he turn back yet? After some attempts of reasoning, pleading, and commands, Elijah concludes that it's not that Klaus doesn't want to change. It's that he can't.

Elijah, of course can't leave his brother out in the woods, so he does one of the following:

A) Coax him into the car

B) Picks him up like a puppy

C) Knocks him out and takes him back to their house, where Rebekah is both shocked and instantly worried. They have a quick uodate discussion which ends with Elijah asking/ordering Rebekah to keep an eye on Klaus while he tries to figure out which witch cursed their brother (again).

Rebekah: Why am I always the babysitter?

Elijah: Rebekah, please, just make sure he doesn't run away. *whoosh*

Rebekah, as she glances at Klaus: Or a petsitter in this case.

Klaus growls at her for that.

Rebekah: Oh don't give me that, you furball, or I'll give you a bath. A flea bath.

Klaus snips at her, which only makes Rebekah laugh, because if Klaus still can be a vindictive ass, he will be fine.

Meanwhile, Elijah contacts Hayley to ask her about this strange occurrence, but since most wolves don't have a choice in shifting schedule, she doesn't know either, but she promises to ask around, maybe Jackson knows something she doesn't. So Elijah heads to the witches, because clearly they are the culprit, and yet, after numerous threats, and choking scenes later, they still deny any involvement, so Elijah has to conclude they aren't the culprit. He is forced to regroup, finding Hayley and Jackson already there. (Insert Freya if she is there, telling them she couldn't find any traces of magic on Klaus, so it is definitely Klaus' doing.) Which baffles everyone, more so Elijah, because clearly, Klaus would prefer to be a vampire, unless....

Unless it's psychological. Marcel comes strolling in. He wanted to investigate the news about a lone wolf appearing and there he is.

The group concludes that Marcel is probably right, groaning inwardly, except for Rebekah, who voices her (and everyone else's) opinion on the complexity of Klaus' issues, and finding the reason why he doesn't want to change might take them ages. With no other choice left, they turn to Cami.

Cami takes one look at Klaus and turns to Elijah with a mortified, confused look: Do you want me to have a session with a wolf?

Elijah: No, I would appreciate if you could help us figure out what's stopping Niklaus from turning back.

Cami, slightly fed up with the ordeal already, concludes that something must have happened recently that made Klaus want to change, have a new perspective on things, etc. Everyone wrecks their brain, throwing accusing glances and words at each other, especially Marcel, who denies any involvement.

It's not until the doorbell rings that finally it clicks for Rebekah that Elijah and she wanted to throw a surprise party for Klaus for one reason or another and that maybe that could be the reason. Putting two and two together, they conclude that Klaus must have overheard their conversation, or at least parts of it, (which he did). Reassuring Klaus that no, they don't want to leave him or conspire against him, they just wanted to celebrate him brings Klaus out of his sulking.

(His sulking started by him hearing Elijah telling Rebekah that she can't tell any of what they have discussed to Klaus. Hurt by feeling left out, especially from Elijah's secrets, his brother’s lack of trust was the reason he wanted to be left alone for a while. Which failed because he wasn’t left alone at the end, though he enjoyed the fussing, eventually it comes to an end.) So there he is, shifting back, butt naked.

Their reactions: Elijah has seen it all before, but he might have failed to provide clothes this time. He is upset enough to not bother grabbing something for Klaus. They are at home anyway. Klaus can take care of himself.

Rebekah is exhausted, and doesn't care one way or another, more annoyed than anything.

Hayley probably looks away, not something she didn't see before, but now she is not interested, thank you.

Jackson is definitely measuring sizes, undoubtedly.

Cami is trying for modesty, but she is definitely checking him out, which Klaus doesn't mind a bit.

Marcel is just happy it wasn’t anything serious this time.

They send Klaus away to get dressed while they set everything up for the party. A few hours later, they have a blast despite the rough start.

walking into dragonsreach to alert jarl balgruuf of the dragon attack on helgen

I don't understand people who think Klaus had a "redemption" or was ooc in The Originals.

He just yelled less and thought a little bit more. Which is being generous too.

A thing I wish DAO went into more: the way Alistair is in some ways incredibly selfish. Like, the way he refuses to take charge of the group is treated as kind of endearing in the text, but the game doesn't really get into what a massive burden he just... drops on the junior Warden present with no warning or discussion. Think about it: the Warden is heavily implied to be very young (possibly younger than Alistair, definitely around the same age), most of them have no real experience in leadership, several of them have no experience in the world outside their small corner, all of them have only been Wardens for a few days. And Alistair dumps leadership of the group on them and refuses to take any of that weight. Does your Warden like leadership? Are they any good at it? Is it exhausting and difficult for them? Alistair doesn't care! He doesn't want to lead, and that means you have to lead, and whether or not you want to lead has no bearing on that. It's not a discussion, there's no suggestion of sharing the responsibility of leadership as the Wardens of the group; Alistair metaphorically throws the responsibility at you and runs.

But if you go for low approval with Alistair it's basically all about calling him childish and immature, even though I think a much more compelling low approval dynamic is the Warden despising Alistair for putting so much on them with no hesitation, but being stuck with him (because they know as well as he does that they need all hands on deck Warden-wise) and stuck with that burden of leadership (because a Warden kind of has to be in charge of the group and even if one didn't no one else in the group would be very good as a leader in this situation, and Alistair has made it very clear that he won't take it). Even at high approval it would be very compelling to have this sense of resentment at how Alistair just assumed they'd take on the burden of leadership and refuses to take any of it for himself. But that aspect gets completely ignored in the story, you don't really get the chance to raise the matter aside from asking why you're in charge despite him being the senior Warden present a couple of times.

It also adds something really spicy to the fallout of sparing Loghain, though, because... Alistair forced the Warden to take on leadership. He made them be the one to make these hard choices. It's never been a discussion, it's never been the Warden's choice whether or not they take on responsibility for these tough decisions, Alistair always just expects them to do it. And now they've made a call he doesn't like, and he abandons the group on the eve of battle because of his wounded feelings? I'd argue that's as much a betrayal as sparing Loghain if not more so, and certainly more of a betrayal of Duncan's memory; Duncan understood that a good Warden must be driven by necessity, not emotion or even morality, and I feel like in the Warden's place he likely would've made the same call. They need Wardens around to kill the Archdemon, as many as they can get, and even one more could make the difference between victory and defeat. The Warden and Alistair may not know the details, but with the most senior Warden present saying they should make Loghain a Warden instead of killing him a logical assumption would be he has a very good reason for saying so and maybe they should listen to him! I would've loved it if during the argument with Alistair after sparing Loghain you could really get into that "You forced the responsibility of making these decisions on me when I never wanted or asked for it, you don't get to throw a tantrum now that I've made one you don't like" aspect of it, but you... don't. And that's a shame, because it takes a lot of depth away from his dynamic with the Warden.

Anyone who critiques klamille as rushed, random, ooc or undeveloped whilst shipping any other Klaus Mikaelson ship just gets an eye roll from me lmao. Just ship your ship and dont speak on klamille because it is literally the most developed romantic ship Klaus had. The writers actually took their time developing the dynamic. Not to rush to humanize him even if it was out of nowhere, not to lay the groundwork for a spinoff, but to show an actual soulmate connection over time. The fact that stans of those ships with lesser quality &writing even have the nerve to speak on klamille…their antis are so bold and wrong.